


Wassail

by JjdoggieS



Series: All Is Calm, All Is Bright [23]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: (at the end lmao), Alternate Universe, Christmas, Cute, Diego is stressed, Diego may or may not be fighting on in this, Dress Up, F/M, Ficmas, Ficmas 2020, Flirting, Fluff, Harcest Ficmas, Harcest Ficmas 2020, Implied Sexual Content, Making Out, Mentions of Karens, because he may or may not have upset vanya, he really doesn't know, slightly meta, sorry to anyone that speaks or understands russian, that's up to you to decide, there is probably things that make no sense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-12 06:02:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28505661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JjdoggieS/pseuds/JjdoggieS
Summary: When Diego had accidentally told Vanya that he hadn't ever really enjoyed, or liked, Christmas. He hadn't expected the lovely surprise she had quickly planned for him. Maybe Christmas isn't too bad after all.Harcest Ficmas: Day 23 - Christmas Sweaters
Relationships: Diego Hargreeves/Vanya Hargreeves
Series: All Is Calm, All Is Bright [23]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2034832
Kudos: 4
Collections: Harcest Ficmas 2020





	Wassail

**Author's Note:**

  * For [soitgoes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/soitgoes/gifts).



It wasn’t uncommon for people to not like the holidays. It wasn’t. Some because of tragedy. Others because of familial issues. And some people simply didn’t like or enjoy the holidays. Each reason that anyone had for not liking a holiday or the holiday season was absolutely and utterly valid, and it needs no explanation. 

And Diego, was one of the people who hadn’t ever  _ really liked _ the holidays. Even when he was a kid, just something about the fake ‘holiday cheer’ that he saw the adults in his life put on every year, pretending everything was fine. And while for most people, having a month, maybe two months, of falsified jolliness was one of the bigger appeals to the holiday season. But for Diego, the fakeness of it all deterred any of the enjoyment most people had for the holidays.

Over the course of his life, Diego learned to  _ not _ tell other people about his general disdain for the holidays. Since those who  _ did _ enjoy the holiday, or at least claimed to, couldn’t begin to comprehend how someone could possibly not like the pseudo religious, capitalism centered, socially expected perfectionism holiday. Diego found it far easier to grin and bear it through the holidays rather than trying to explain to every Karen, Susan, and Jessica that he didn’t celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza, or any other holidays in December. For the first fifteen years of his life, when he could actually make decisions that held value and had consequences, Diego learned how to pretend and deal with the holidays, and it  _ generally _ went over well enough that he could skate by another year without having some big altercation with someone.

But this year, this year was a bit different. This year his girlfriend, Vanya, would be coming from Russia to America, and the shithole in Indiana he lived in, to stay with him for an entire month. This year he either had to explain to his girlfriend that he didn’t care for the holidays or he had to pretend to for an entire month nearly 24/7 that he at least tolerated the holiday season. Diego elected to, at least at first, just deal with the holidays and do whatever Vanya wanted to do. It was unsurprising how absolutely draining it was to be on his happier side for two and a half weeks, doing various typical holiday activities with Vanya.

By the time it was December 20th, Diego was about to lose his shit.

Now typically, Diego wasn’t an overly spiteful person, even during the holidays. But, having to be putting on a front of being jolly and jovial all the time, even when having to deal with Susans and Karens at least twice every day, was absolutely exhausting; and it was pushing Diego ever closer to just snapping at the next person that annoyed him. Obviously, he needed to do something before he got into  _ another _ fight with some middle-aged mother of three with a horrible hair cut and an entitled attitude.

And while he could’ve told Vanya that he’d rather just lay around all day and be lazy and watch movies on the 25th, he’d seen how excited Vanya was about all the little things most adults  _ didn’t _ care about, and Diego didn’t want to ruin whatever little joys that she’d found in things he didn’t, just because he didn’t like the holidays. She’d told him that she’d celebrated Christmas with her mother and father, but it was vastly different in Russia than it was in America, or Indiana. He settled on telling Vanya about his disliking for the holiday  _ after _ Christmas, he needed to be honest with her about  _ this _ but he also didn’t need to possibly ruin her holiday last minute.

He’d planned on the 20th of December to tell her on the 27th of December. But, as fate would have it, he’d tell her, on accident, on the 22nd.

“I want to go walk,” Vanya told him, pulling on his hand, “with you!” Her broken English was rather adorable to Diego, especially since when they’d met (through a friend of a friend) he knew no Russian, and Vanya hardly knew any English. He felt special being able to both watch and help Vanya learn English, just as she helped him learn  _ some _ Russian. The wide smile that she gave him, trying to goad him into doing what she wanted, which, in this case, was just, going on a walk.

“Alright,” Diego said, in a faked annoyed tone, taking a hold of Vanya’s hand that had been pulling on him, “we can go take a walk. If that’s what you  _ really _ want to do?” Vanya gave him an excited nod, which he took as a ‘yes’ and pulled on his coat on, Vanya doing the same, and then walked out of Diego’s condo together. On their walk, which Diego had planned to only be around the neighborhood, Vanya was amused by the lights and over the top Christmas decorations that Diego’s neighbor’s had on their houses, pointing out some of them to him as they walked. 

While on their walk, the one person Diego would be happy to  _ never _ see again, with the worst, most cliche name for the type of person she was, Karen Smith, and her three snotty kids, Whiny, Annoying, and Terror. “Oh, Diego!” God he hated this woman, “What a  _ pleasure _ it is to see you again. And who is this, your sister?” The  _ look _ she had was telling enough that she  _ knew _ that they weren’t siblings, it’s not like they looked similar at all either. She was just doing this to piss him off, and it was working.

“This is Vanya,” Diego said, pulling lightly on Vanya’s hand, drawing her attention from the innocent acting children in front of them and over to him, “my  _ girlfriend _ .” He returned Karen’s knowing, faked pleasurable grin.

“Hello,” Vanya said, looking between Karen and her three horrible children, giving each of them a small wave and a smile, “it is nice to meet you.”

Diego had always had  _ anger issues _ growing up, and for a while he’d had them under control, but  _ Karen _ seemed to find all the ways to get under his skin and find all the cracks in his composure. And on occasion, when he got  _ really _ heated, Diego would have blackouts. And, unfortunately, while he and  _ Karen _ got into some squabble about some shit he ‘supposedly’ did, he had one of his blackouts for the first time in nearly seven years. And when he came out of his blackout, he was back at his condo with Vanya handing him a mug of hot black coffee.

As he asked Vanya what happened, sincerely hoping he hadn’t  _ actually _ fought some middle aged mother, again, but she wouldn’t tell him anything more than that she’d ‘handle’ everything and not to worry about it, nothing more than that. The fact that his hands didn’t hurt like they did when he  _ has _ punched someone, was causing him to be fairly certain he hadn’t gotten into any physical altercation with Karen. But there was something  _ off _ about how Vanya was acting around him, distant, a bit cold, like he’d been cut out in an instant. Clearly, he’d done something, and it either upset Vanya or was directed at her. Whatever he’d done, he needed to fix it, and fast.

For the rest of the evening, whenever Diego would try to talk to Vanya, she’d be short with him or flat out ignore and avoid him. No matter what he said or tried to do, she wouldn’t tell him anything, and just gave him sad looks when she thought he wasn’t paying attention. The next morning, before Diego could even make another attempt to figure out what he’d done after a night of failures, he woke up to an empty bed and Vanya nowhere to be found in the condo. For a moment, Diego was worried that Vanya had left in the middle of the night, whatever he’d done was enough for Vanya to go back to Russia without another word; but when he saw that she’d left her stuff there, only her coat, phone, and wallet being gone, Diego was fairly sure that she’d be back. She had to come back. Right?

Trying to take his mind off of the fact that there was a  _ chance _ that Vanya  _ had _ left him in the middle of the night, Diego went to the gym he worked at  _ and  _ worked out at. He needed a distraction, and punching shit nearly always helped him figure out his shit. Hoping that Vanya  _ would _ be coming back, Diego left a note on the kitchen counter for her, telling her that he’d be back in an hour or so.

Rather than the hour he’d intended, he left the gym after two hours of punching what was essentially  _ his _ punching bag and a quick shower and returned to his condo and was extraordinarily happy to find that Vanya’s coat, phone, and wallet were back in their places, which only meant, that she was back. 

“Vanya?” Diego called, hearing his own voice echo through the rooms, “Are you here?”

“Yeah!” Vanya called back, muffled by the door to his unused office. When Diego walked over to it, trying to open the door only to find it locked, Vanya’s voice called back through the door, “I, I have surprise. For you Diego. Could you go, wait in living room?”

Diego told her he would, more focused on the fact that Vanya  _ had _ come back as he’d hoped than what she’d told him. As he sat in his living room, waiting for whatever Vanya had in store for him, Diego heard the door unlock, click open and click shut, some bells jingling as it did. He turned his head slightly, trying to see what Vanya was doing when she hissed at him, “Nyet! Ne smotri ty idiot!” Once his face was pointed in front of him, not looking back at her in the slightest, Diego could hear the clicking of some heel on shoes and more bell jingling with each step, stopping a few feet from behind the couch. “Close your eyes.” Vanya told him, and when he did, she added, “With your hands!” Diego put his hands over his closed eyes and once he had, the heels clicked from behind the couch to standing in front of him, “Okay, otkryvat!”

He dropped his hands from covering his eyes, opening his eyes to find Vanya in what could only be described as a sexy Santa Claus outfit. High black boots, a red low cut v-neck dress with a short skirt and sleeves that reached her elbows, hemmed with white fur, a big black belt around her waist with a gold buckle, and a Santa hat. “Who’s been a good boy this year?” Vanya asked, with a bright, toothy grin on her face, nearly bouncing with excitement.

Although what she’d said likely wasn’t phrased the best, Diego could figure out what she’d meant. Diego wrapped both his hands around her hips, pulling Vanya forward and onto his lap, her legs on both sides of his, “I have an idea of who has.” Diego purred into her ear, feeling Vanya practically vibrate against him as he did, rubbing one of his hands down from her hips and down her leg.

“Oh really?” Vanya asked, biting her lip, “And who would that be?” She looped her arms around Diego’s neck, pressing her forehead to his.

Diego hooked his arms under Vanya’s legs and lifted her up with him as he stood up off the couch, Vanya wrapping her legs around him as he did. Working at and going to the gym as much as he did was  _ definitely  _ paying off. Before he was even able to take a step away from the couch, Vanya’s lips had found his with an exorbitant amount of enthusiasm. When she’d first started kissing him, Diego  _ nearly _ lost his balance, more out of surprise than anything else, but quickly regained his balance, and quickly kissed her back with an equal amount of ferocity. Vanya’s hands moved from being looped around Diego’s neck and up into his hair, giving some of his longer strands a bit of a pull.

After a few moments of what had quickly turned into making out in the middle of his living room, Diego pulled back a bit, Vanya tucking her head into the side of his neck, nuzzling into it and planting some kisses as he started off towards the bedroom, which luckily was only a little ways down the hall, near the office. Diego pushed the slightly opened door further open with his foot, the wooden door nearly hitting the wall behind it as it swung open. He moved towards the bed, carefully dropping Vanya onto it before practically crawling on top of her.

Vanya’s hands reached up to his face, cupping the sides as she told him, “Dorogoi, ya tebya lyublyu.”

“Ya lyublyu tebya, dorogaya.” Diego replied, pulling one of Vanya’s hands from his face and peppering it in kisses until she pulled it away.

“You mean that?” Vanya asked, her eyes locked on his, and Diego could make out the slightest bit of fear in them before he told her that he  _ did _ mean what he’d told her. Once he did, Vanya’s cheeks flushed and she chewed her lip, as she smiled back at him, her hands running up and down his arms, from his wrists up to his biceps and back down again. Each motion and movement of her hands sliding up and down his arms sending shivers down his spine. 

“You know Vanya,” Diego started, feeling the stupid and annoying shit-eating grin on his face as he added, in a completely serious tone despite the fit of laughter that was trying to escape him, “I think I’m starting to like Christmas.” Vanya rolled her eyes at him, although the small grin on her face told him that she wasn’t  _ actually _ annoyed with him, before her hands reached up and pulled him down to her. Vanya hungrily kissed him again and again, Diego returning each kiss with his own.

Even though he’d said it as a joke to Vanya, if more and more holidays were going to get as  _ special _ of treatment from Vanya, then maybe they won’t be too bad. And maybe even, the slightest bit bearable. 

**Author's Note:**

> Update survey if you're interested -> https://forms.gle/kj4UBqMeUThavmnx6


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